Sandy got this right, a primary in the tonsil can be as small as 2mm. That is not a typo. At that size it can spin off daughter cells that travel rapidly through the normal lymph drainage system in the the cervical nodes and overnight you are moving from a stage one to a stage four when that happens. The only way to biopsy the tonsil is to take the whole thing, a 2mm primary won't even show up on a scan. I have a previous post up about a study we did with Hopkins that looks at this phenomenon

Brian, stage 4 oral cancer survivor. OCF Founder and Director. The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say thank you. In between, the leader is a servant.